TIME's board says the Internet will transform nearly everything, mostly for good. But don't take it for granted

Story has it that a Washington taxi driver once told an inquiring passenger that the motto on the National Archives Building, WHAT IS PAST IS PROLOGUE, really means "You ain't seen nothin' yet." In the case of the Internet and American business, the motto could be changed to WHAT IS PRESENT IS PROLOGUE--but it would translate the same way.

By many gauges, the Internet is already huge. As a business communications tool, it surpassed the telephone last year, when 3 billion e-mail messages were sent each day. Revenues of what might be called the Internet economy last year surpassed $300 billion,...